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[FYI] EU seeks quantum cryptography response to Echelon - und neue Kryptodebatte V 3.0 in Sicht



[Quntenkryptographie ist noch nicht mal richtig praxistauglich, da 
kommt schon gleich die naechste Key-Escrow-Debatte um die Ecke ...]

<http://www.thestandard.com/article.php?story=20040517152322624>

EU seeks quantum cryptography response to Echelon

Monday, May 17 2004 @ 03:11 PM GMT
By Philip Willan, IDG News Service

The European Union is to invest €11 million (US $13 million) over the 
next four years to develop a secure communication system based on 
quantum cryptography, using physical laws governing the universe on 
the smallest scale to create and distribute unbreakable encryption 
keys, project coordinators said Monday.  

If successful, the project will produce the cryptographer's holy 
grail -- absolutely unbreakable code -- and thwart the eavesdropping 
efforts of espionage systems such as Echelon, which intercepts 
electronic messages on behalf of the intelligence services of the 
U.S., Britain, Canada, New Zealand and Australia.  

"The aim is to produce a communication system that cannot be 
intercepted by anyone, and that includes Echelon," said Sergio Cova, 
a professor from the electronics department of Milan Polytechnic and 
one of the project's coordinators. "We are talking about a system 
that requires significant technological innovations. We have to prove 
that it is workable, which is not the case at the moment." Major 
improvements in geographic range and speed of data transmission will 
be required before the system becomes a commercial reality, Cova 
said.  

"The report of the European Parliament on Echelon recommends using 
quantum cryptography as a solution to electronic eavesdropping. This 
is an effort to cope with Echelon," said Christian Monyk, the 
director of quantum technologies at the Austrian company ARC 
Seibersdorf Research GmbH and overall coordinator of the project. 
Economic espionage has caused serious harm to European companies in 
the past, Monyk said. "With this project we will be making an 
essential contribution to the economic independence of Europe."  

[...]

Monyk believes there will be a global market of several million users 
once a workable solution has been developed. A political decision 
will have to be taken as to who those users will be in order to 
prevent terrorists and criminals from taking advantage of the 
completely secure communication network, he said.  

"In my view it should not be limited to senior government officials 
and the military, but made available to all users who need really 
secure communications," Monyk said. Banks, insurance companies and 
law firms could be potential clients, Monyk said, and a decision will 
have to be made as to whether and how a key could be made available 
to law enforcement authorities under exceptional circumstances. "It 
won't be up to us to decide who uses our results," said Milan 
Polytechnic's Cova. ::    



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